friday, March 3

d went home around noon, we watched wichita vs. indiana game and as expected, wichita won. after that, we watched creighton vs. bradley. bradley was the hottest team in the league, they had been on a nice winning streak coming into the tournament while creighton played without one of their starters due to injury, but dana altman is a very good coach so it still possible for creighton to come up with a win, but too bad they lost, i think it's the first time in a few years that they lost in the first round game. anyway..ben came right when the game was over so we left the house right away, picked up hana at school and went to savvis center. we already have the ticket that we bought yesterday, using the 10% off coupons from taco bell, hehe. tapi sayangnya duduknya di upper bowl, but there were lots of empty seats at the lower level so we just sit on those empty seats. it was a of course an exciting game, pretty high scoring for us who are not good offensively...we played against evansville, we lost the last time we played them so i knew we weren't gonna lose again..payback is a biatch baby. Jamal Tatum was the star that night, i know from now on we will always go to him no matter what, for better or worse, for richer and poorer, in sickness and in health.. Foster had a hell of a game too, the crowd went crazy when he threw in a dunk..he actually almost had a double2 that night. the sweet part was when the students started chanting for smithpeters to play, and when he had the ball and was wide open at the 3 point line, the students screamed..SHOOOOTT..haha..he shoot it and it went it..3 points for him..hehe.

abis itu ben went home and we decided to stay to watch missouri state vs. northern iowa, we're gonna face the winner of this game tomorrow. the game started 20 minutes after our session..jadi muter muter aja dulu, ordered some food and stuff. jibran seneng banget deh di ajak ke ball game gini, proudly wearing his salukis t-shirt..high fiving orang orang yang lewat di depannya, hehe..banyak yang manggil jibran lil' salukis. anyway..the first half of the next game nya lumayan seru sih, fansnya juga rame banget. Jibrannya udah mulai kecapean pas jam segitu..iya lah udah jam 9.30 an..jadi dia duduk aja di pangku. the salukis players came out of the locker room and sit around behind the bench and watched the game. pas half time d went to the ticket office to buy tickets for tomorrows game tapi sayang udah tutup..so we just had to get the ticket before the game tomorrow. pas second half kurang seru game nya, msu suddenly turned flat on the offensive end..so northern iowa it is for us tomorrow. Kita sampe rumah jam 11 malem, adit smsed congratulating on the win dan bilang kalo besok mau ikutan..yaayyy..the more the merrier...

saturday, March 4
pagi pagi udah bangun..hehe..padahal game nya jam 4..:p but we actually left the house around 11. Stopped by savvis center to buy the student tickets..tapi katanya boothnya baru buka sejam sebelum game nya mulai..huu. jadi ya udah kita ke delmar aja dulu, bought bubble tea and crispy chicken trus jemput adit di rumahnya, tante anne nawarin apa jibran mau di titipin ajaa...tapi kasian sih jibrannya soalnya dia udah tau kalo mau di ajak nonton basket dan udah teriak teriak S-I-U gitu..hehe, kan kasian..akhirnya gue bilang besok aja deh kalo misalnya nanti menang..:D. Di sana sekalian nonton wichita vs. bradley..tapi cuma sebentar sih nontonnya..soalnya harus buru2 balik ke savvis center lagi untuk beli ticket..ngantri nya panjang soalnya. sampe sana jam 3-an dan udah mulai pada ngantri, padahal ticket boothnya juga belum buka..and we only have 2 student id, jadi harus 2 orang yang ngantri..untung nggak ketauan pake ID yang sama. Setelah itu langsung masuk dan sempet nonton 3 menit terakhir gamenya wichita vs. bradley, and bradley prevailed and moved on to the final vs either us or UNI. This time kita dapet duduknya di student section, right behind the basket..jadi aja harus berdiri terus the entire game, hehe. Agak ngeri juga nih game ini, while we played good last night..UNI played good too although I don't know if they were that good last night or it was just MSU playing like crap.

The first few minutes of the game was pretty stressing to watch with the referees calling every ticky tack foul on our sides..huhu. the score at half time was 20-20..hehe, it's a pretty low scoring game, well what do you expect, we are a defensive minded team..:p. Dan lucunya..pas second half abis score nya 40-40..hehehe. northern Iowa was actually up by 2, 40 seconds left into the game..but mullins tied the game with a drive to the basket. Udah takut aja mereka bakalan hit game winning shot tapi untung aja jacobson missed his three..yayy..tony young did a good job defending him, so on to overtime. it started with a dunk from falker and he was fouled, so it was a 3-point play. shaw took over the game on overtime, i guess he wanted a win on his birthday!!

setelah itu, kita kemana yaaah...kayanya langsung ke party city di olive deh..sepanjang jalan ribut ngomongin game besok..hehe..iya lah championship game gitu loch and our post season is on the brink..kita mikirin pake baju apa, bawa sign apa..dll. adit came up with a few brilliant sign ideas..hehe..since it will be broadcasted on cbs, jadi lucu aja kalo ada CBS2 nya kaya: Curse Breaking Shoes (I will elabore more on that later..). Cool but So. ILL..haha..dan buat shaw ada I came, I shaw (instead of saw), I conquer..:D..waduuh udah excited banget dehh di jalan. Pas di party city juga ribuuutt banget kita..nyoba2 in wig dan pernak pernik lain, beli face paint, spidol, kacamata dan lain sebagainya. Abis itu kita ke northwest plaza untuk beli salukis t-shirt di steve and barry..trus langsung ke rumahnya adit dan mulai bikin signnya...eh enggak deh, adit, manda hana ke walmart dulu beli2 perlengkapan lagi..hehe..asli kita niaattt banget. Kayanya yang ada di sana (Reza, Freddy, Edwin, Melisa, Ading) pada bingung ngeliat kita mau pada ngapain sih sebenernya...hehehe. Tapi manda, Edwin sama Melisa jadi mau ikutan besok..sama happy juga..asiiiikk rame kaan jadinya. Ya udah Manda mulai bikin sign2nya..gue sih nontonin aja..hehe..maklum nggak kreatif..:p. Kita pulang sekitar jam 12 malem.

Sunday, March 5
This is the day..semalem sampe nggak bisa tidur gara gara mikirin hari ini, hehe..sampe jam 6 pagi juga udah bangun bangun terus..:p..akhirnya jam 8 bangun, siapin ini itu, siapin breakfastnya jibran, mandi, mandiin jibran dan lain lain sebagainya. Jam 10 lewat berangkat deh, ke rumahnya manda dulu..soalnya jibran mau di titipin di sana..sampe sana langsung pada pake atributnya masing masing, ada yang face painting, dll. Trus jam 11 lewat berangkat deh..Happy udah sampe sana duluan, lagi ngantri di ticket boothnya..padahal juga belum buka gitu.. Pas jam 12 baru buka, some girls from creighton were selling their student tickets for less than face value, jadi ya lumayan laahh.. we got our student tickets again and then off we went inside. Ternyata di dalem udah lumayan rame, dan kita lumayan di liatin orang orang..hahaha..seru deh pokonya seruuuu. Pas kita masuk aja itu kan masih 40 menit sebelum game nya mulai, tapi orang orang udah pada heboh. Pas first half nya seru gamenya..kita marah marahin wasitnya..hehehe, "wasit picek?!?!"..hihihi..sempet ketinggalan beberapa point juga but we managed to come back and only down by one at half time. the second half was another story..I don't know what got into the team during half time, but they really gave it their all and left everything on the court, it was by far the best effort from the team..really it was salukis basketball at its finest..they just kept scoring (i have never seen so many dunks in one game before) and scattered bradley's defense apart and they took their defense to another level, forcing turnovers and making bradley scoreless for more than 8 minutes. Pokonya seru seru seru...I screamed at the top of my lungs for the whole duration, sang the fight song and bouncing up and down till my belly h
ur
ts. Suasananya baru berubah waktu ada kejadian cheerleader jatuh seperti yang udah di ceritain di postingan sebelumnya. I think it was 3 minutes into the game, setelah gamenya di mulai lagi, Bradley stole an inbound pass twice and made two three pointer..huhu..i was a bit scared even though we were up by more than 10 point at that time, but we were fouled a couple of times and we made those free throws, shaw hit a three too and then some.

Waktu 2 menit terakhir itu..orang orang yang duduk di atas mulai pada turun, jadi pada mendekat ke courtnya gitu, udah siap siap mau storm the court..hahaha..gue juga udah bilang pokonya kalo menang i am storming the court..hihi...and I did..with thousands other people..:p. Pokonya pas buzzernya bunyi..semuanya langsung pada lari ke court..and the string streamer fell down from the rafters with the WE ARE THE CHAMPION song in the background..it felt so surreal..haha *norak*...trus ya udah abis itu kita foto2 dong, ngeliatin pemainnya yang lagi pada di interview, trus di set up panggung di courtnya to give them the award. Pemainnya udah pada pake championship t-shirt aja. Randal Falker was the MVP...he was really unstoppable in the second half...i told you he is one tough motherFalker..:PP..hahaa...talk about MEET THE FALKER!!!. Mullins came up big too, he only played for 5 minutes in the first half cause he had a sprained ankle..but he played for 16 minutes in the second half and the difference was clear..our offense was much better with mullins on the floor. he is a true point guard..even UNI coach complimented him on the post game interview yesterday, he basically said that if you look the word point guard on the dictionary, mullin's picture is on there, he is thaatt goood..=). anyway...abis itu gunting net nya deh..dan fans2nya masih asik aja gitu di dalem sampe securitynya escorted everybody out the court..hehe. Dari situ kita makan di Hooters Union Station..of course i was still smiling and just couldn't stop talking about the game..:P

This victory gave us the automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament, that was why winning the conference tournament was so important..soalnya kalo kemaren itu kita nggak menang, kayanya nggak bakalan masuk NCAA as an at large bid, kalo 4 taun berikutnya sih masih bisa since we finished first in the regular season, but our record was not as impressive this year. Soo happy for them to be able to keep the streak of the NCAA appearance (there are only 16 school in the nation that have been to the tournament 5 times in a row), so it is quite a record for the salukis. We are a young team, with no senior on the starting line up, that's why we've been so inconsistent dan nge break banyak good streak; home winning streak, the regular season champion, etc. But in the end, they did break the bad streak too; udah 10 taun lebih kita nggak pernah menang di MVC tournament ini even with a much superior team, but this team is capable of doing so, and most importantly ya the NCAA streak itu. So in the end, they won the game that's counted the most. It's gotta be the shoes babyy...hehehe. Biasanya kan pemainnya pake sepatu putih maroon, tapi jamaal tatum and tony young had an idea to make a fashion statement by changing the shoes for the tournament, jadi sepatu hitam dan kaos kaki hitam..katanya ya siapa tau aja jadi bisa menang, hehe..superstitious banget yaa..but whatever it took to win lah pokonya..lagian kan kalo hitam2 gitu jadinya kan garang dan arrogant aja keliatannya, so maybe it boosted their confidences..and hey it worked!! Good job guys...now make some noise in the NCAA!!!